Earlier we reported that Epic Games had announced during GDC 2014 that Unreal Engine 4 would become a subscription-based product, in which developers will be able to access the engine, editors, and even the source code for $19.99 a month.
This is good news for small time developers looking to make some pretty impressive games or utilize Unreal Engine 4 for other purposes. However it seems that Crytek has decided to follow in Epic Games’ footsteps by announcing a similar subscription model for its CryEngine technology as well.
According to Crytek, the fees for subscribing will be set at $10 a month and will give developers access to all of CryEngine’s development tools. This includes the geometry cache and image based lighting features. The rates will be cheaper than Unreal Engine 4, but at the end of the day we guess it’s up to developers to decide which engine suits them best.
Speaking at GDC, Crytek’s Director of Business Developer, Carl Jones, was quoted as saying, “When we announced the new CryEngine this was our first step towards creating an engine as a service. We are happy to announce now that the latest update of CryEngine will soon be available to all developers on a subscription basis. We are really excited to make CryEngine available to hundreds of thousands of developers working with Crytek to make awesome games.”
The access to CryEngine will allow developers to develop for all platforms, ranging from mobile such as iOS, to current-gen consoles like the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4. For those unfamiliar with CryEngine, it has been used to power games like the Xbox One’s Ryse: Son of Rome and Crysis 3.
Crytek expects to begin the subscription service starting in May while the free CryEngine SDK will still be made available for download albeit for non-commercial development purposes only.